By Chad Klassen

Ending state of emergency comes as relief to wildfire workers

Sep 15, 2017 | 4:42 PM

KAMLOOPS — The fight is still not done as 155 fires continue to burn around the Southern Interior, but cooler temperatures have prompted the government to lift the provincial state of emergency as of midnight.

It’s been a long, exhausting two months for anyone affected by this summer’s historic wildfire season. From the time the province declared the State of Emergency on July 7, a day after the Elephant Hill wildfire ignited near Ashcroft, it’s been non-stop for fire crews and evacuees. 

“This has been more than two months now, the State of Emergency. July 7 is when a lot of this really came to a head. We had over 130 fires start in a single day, a lot of these in the Cariboo and Kamloops Fire Centre,” said B.C.’s chief fire information officer Kevin Skrepnek. “A long, arduous summer for a lot of folks out there. Certainly welcomed news to see a bit of a reprieve.”

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The State of Emergency, first initiated by the Liberals, was extended four times as wildfires continued to spread, forcing more evacuations and sending more people to the emergency reception centre in Kamloops. 

“It’s been pretty exhausting, it’s been over two months of non-stop, going for pretty well every single day throughout this period,” said TNRD information officer Debbie Sell. “All of us in the emergency operation centre, and those down at the reception centre, really have gone non-stop since this took off.”

In all, close to 22,000 evacuees were helped by the TNRD during the summer. Staff note it was an emotionally-draining two months as well, listening to people’s heart-wrenching stories and having to make tough phone calls. 

“There’s been highs and there’s been lows. The lows definitely of seeing the structures that have been lost,” said Sell. “One of my roles actually was to initiative those phone calls with people who had lost structures. So I was often the first person they spoke to to find out about their loss. That is really hard. You know that is someone’s home.”

Since April, there has been almost 1.2 million hectares burned across the province — the most in the history of B.C.

The cooler weather, which prompted the government to drop the State of Emergency, is providing relief to the ongoing firefighting efforts in the Interior. 

“We’re starting to see the fall weather set in, certainly doesn’t mean the end of fire season. I expect we’re going to have activity for a while yet,” said Skrepnek. “But I think the more dramatic fire behaviour, the more aggressive stuff we’ve been seeing out there is going to start to really die down as we get into next week.”